The term "unmanned" appears with increasing frequency - particularly when it comes to warfare.
Remote-controlled aircraft are particularly busy. The U.S. military has used Predator Drones to take out a several Al Qaeda leaders and last fall announced they'd used a new type of unmanned aircraft to kill two Iraqi's who were trying to plant a road side bomb.
Last summer, the U.S. Army began using the first armed ground robot in Iraq. The robot, picture above, is called special weapons observation remote reconnaissance direct action system or SWORDS.
So robots are good right? Not everyone thinks so.
Professor Noel Sharkey, a computer scientist and robot engineer from the UK's University of Sheffield, fears that robots pose a threat to humanity.
It sounds like something right out of a science fiction fim - think I, Robot, the 2004 film in which Will Smith battles legions of rampaging humanoid 'bots. But Sharkey, who once judged the TV show Robot Wars, warns of a robots arms race, in which countries vie to develop the most lethal autonomous robots and terror groups use unmanned machines instead of suicide bombers.
Sharkey was expected to present his concerns today to the Royal United Services Institute, an military and security research institute in England.
Among his fears:
* A robot arms race. The United States has the largest military robotics program, but a number of other countries around the world are working on their own unmanned war machines.
* War robots could become autonomous. As far as we know, a human being currently decides whether a robot used in battle will fire upon an enemy. If robots become completely autonomous and can fire on their own, Sharkey worries, they may not be able to discern friend from foe, civilian from enemy combatant.
* As robots become more common and the parts become cheap and available, terrorists - or disgruntled high school students? - might be able to build dangerous robots for a few hundred dollars.
Source_:_weblogs.baltimoresun.com
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